Tag: Wall Street

  • Turkey Plans ‘Wall Street of Istanbul’

    Turkey Plans ‘Wall Street of Istanbul’

    Country to invest $2.6 billion to once more become ‘global center of commerce’

    By Marlene Y. Satter, AdvisorOne

    September 18, 2012 • Reprints

    It may not look like much now. But after $2.6 billion is plowed into a bare plot of ground in Atasehir over the next three years, the Istanbul suburb will be transformed into a sparkling ménage of high-rise buildings, a symbol of Turkey’s resumption of a position of power on the global commercial stage.

    Bloomberg reported Tuesday that the plan, advanced by Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan, is an effort to create a one-square-mile “Wall Street of Istanbul” that will be known as IFC-Istanbul—the International Financial Center. Erdogan, whose Justice and Development Party was reelected last year, sees Turkey as a growing center of economic and political power that will make its presence known in the Middle East and southeastern Europe.

    Environment and Urbanization Minister Erdogan Bayraktar said in the report that once IFC-Istanbul is functioning, “Istanbul will assume its historical role as a global center of commerce.” The country’s financial industry has already seen substantial growth even as its economy as a whole expanded by 8.5% in 2011.

    This year alone, Mizuho Financial Group Inc. and Mitsubishi Corp. of Japan, Kuwait’s Burgan Bank SAK and OAO Sberbank of Russia all came to the city, either buying Turkish firms or opening their own offices.

    They have plenty of company; such institutions as Citigroup and HSBC Holdings already have a presence in Istanbul, although currently the financial heart of the city is located in the Levent and Maslak districts.

    Not to be outdone, the Istanbul Stock Exchange has also grown, expanding 26% this year and more than doubling in size since 2009. While still very small compared with New York and London, it is a respectable size, larger by just a bit than Frankfurt’s at $51 billion and almost four times the size of Dubai’s.

    While everything in Istanbul isn’t perfect—some development projects have stalled—foreign investment is soaring, with direct investment 25% higher in the first two months of 2012 than it was a year ago. CEOs and senior executives seek out the Billionaire Club for nightclub entertainment and new hotels, villas and apartments are going up all over the city—with restaurants and other amenities following to satisfy demand.

    “I had no idea how big Istanbul was until I was appointed here,” said Martin Spurling in the report. Spurling, chief executive of HSBC Bank in Turkey, added, “I was shocked. In terms of its location, history, culture, human potential and hospitality, Istanbul’s a great candidate to be an international finance center. We have to explain it to the world a little better.”

    via Turkey Plans ‘Wall Street of Istanbul’.

  • Wall Street protests go global

    Wall Street protests go global

    Occupy wallDemonstrators worldwide shouted their rage on Saturday against bankers and politicians they accuse of ruining economies and condemning millions to hardship through greed and bad government.

    Galvanized by the Occupy Wall Street movement, the protests began in New Zealand, rippled round the world to Europe and were expected to return to their starting point in New York.

    Most rallies were however small and barely held up traffic. The biggest anticipated was in Rome, where organizers said they believed 100,000 would take part.

    “At the global level, we can’t carry on any more with public debt that wasn’t created by us but by thieving governments, corrupt banks and speculators who don’t give a damn about us,” said Nicla Crippa, 49, who wore a T-shirt saying “enough” as she arrived at the Rome protest.

    “They caused this international crisis and are still profiting from it, they should pay for it.”

    The Rome protesters, including the unemployed, students and pensioners, planned to march through the center, past the Colosseum and finish in Piazza San Giovanni.

    Some 2,000 police were on hand to keep the Rome demonstrators, who call themselves “the indignant ones,” peaceful and to avoid a repeat of the violence last year when students protesting over education policy clashed with police.

    “YES WE CAMP”

    As some 750 buses bearing protesters converged on the capital, students at Rome university warmed up with their own mini-demo on Saturday morning.

    The carried signs reading “Your Money is Our Money,” and “Yes We Camp,” an echo of the slogan “Yes We Can” used by U.S. President Barack Obama.

    In imitation of the occupation of Zuccotti Park near Wall Street in Manhattan, some protesters have been camped out across the street from the headquarters of the Bank of Italy for several days.

    The worldwide protests were a response in part to calls by the New York demonstrators for more people to join them. Their example has prompted calls for similar occupations in dozens of U.S. cities from Saturday.

    Demonstrators in Italy were united in their criticism of Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi and angry at his victory in a vote of confidence in parliament on Friday.

    The government has passed a 60 billion-euro austerity package that has raised taxes and will make public health care more expensive.

    On Friday students stormed Goldman Sachs’s offices in Milan and daubed red graffiti. Others hurled eggs at the headquarters of UniCredit, Italy’s biggest bank.

    New Zealand and Australia got the ball rolling on Saturday. Several hundred people marched up the main street in Auckland, New Zealand’s biggest city, joining a rally at which 3,000 chanted and banged drums, denouncing corporate greed.

    About 200 gathered in the capital Wellington and 50 in a park in the earthquake-hit southern city of Christchurch.

    In Sydney, about 2,000 people, including representatives of Aboriginal groups, communists and trade unionists, protested outside the central Reserve Bank of Australia.

    “REAL DEMOCRACY”

    “I think people want real democracy,” said Nick Carson, a spokesman for OccupyMelbourne.Org, as about 1,000 gathered in the Australian city.

    “They don’t want corporate influence over their politicians. They want their politicians to be accountable.”

    Hundreds marched in Tokyo, including anti-nuclear protesters. In Manila, capital of the Philippines, a few dozen marched on the U.S. embassy waving banners reading: “Down with U.S. imperialism” and “Philippines not for sale.”

    More than 100 people gathered at the Taipei stock exchange, chanting “we are Taiwan’s 99 percent,” and saying economic growth had only benefited companies while middle-class salaries barely covered soaring housing, education and healthcare costs.

    They found support from a top businessman, Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Corp (TSMC) Chairman Morris Chang.

    “I’ve been against the gap between rich and poor,” Chang said in the northern city of Hsinchu. “The wealth of the top one percent has increased very fast in the past 20 or 30 years. ‘Occupy Wall Street’ is a reaction to that.”

    Demonstrators aimed to converge on the City of London under the banner “Occupy the Stock Exchange.”

    “We have people from all walks of life joining us every day,” said Spyro, one of those behind a Facebook page in London which has drawn some 12,000 followers.

    The 28-year-old, who said he had a well-paid job and did not want to give his full name, said the target of the protests as “the financial system.”

    Angry at taxpayer bailouts of banks since 2008 and at big bonuses still paid to some who work in them while unemployment blights the lives of many young Britons, he said: “People all over the world, we are saying: ‘Enough is enough’.”

    Greek protesters called an anti-austerity rally for Saturday in Athens’ Syntagma Square.

    “What is happening in Greece now is the nightmare awaiting other countries in the future. Solidarity is the people’s weapon,” the Real Democracy group said in a statement calling on people to join the protest.

    In Paris protests were expected to coincide with the G20 finance chiefs’ meeting there. In Madrid, seven marches were planned to unite in Cibeles square at 1600 GMT (12 p.m. EDT) and then march to the central Puerta de Sol.

    In Germany, where sympathy for southern Europe’s debt troubles is patchy, the financial center of Frankfurt and the European Central Bank in particular are expected to be a focus of marches called by the Real Democracy Now movement.

    Reuters

  • “OCCUPY WALL STREET PROTEST”, TOTAL MEDIA BLACKOUT

    “OCCUPY WALL STREET PROTEST”, TOTAL MEDIA BLACKOUT

    Speaker: We’re going to make our own Tahrir square here

    OCCUPY WALL STREET PROTEST

    Speaker
    Speaker: We're going to make our own Tahrir square here
    The Corrupt Fear Us
    The corrupt fear us. The honest support us. The heroic join us.

    AT LEAST 70,000 AND COUNTING… BIG MEDIA BLACKOUT “Occupy Wall Street”

    10 questions about “Occupy Wall Street” that should be answered urgently:

    1. Why are peaceful protesters being treated as if they are criminals?

    2. Why are thousands of police, and SWAT teams and police dogs, being mobilized to protect Wall Street bankers?

    3. Why are almost all the mainstream media outlets in America ignoring a major civil protest in the heart of New York?

    4. Why do the police not pursue criminal bankers and business leaders with the same venom and force that they use when pursuing protesters who have so far done nothing wrong?

    5. Why is nothing being done to address the genuine economic problems in America? Why, instead, is the old system – the one that failed disastrously in 2008 – being rebuilt brick by brick, fault by fault?

    6. How much longer will the doctrine of ‘plausible denial’ be allowed to act as an excuse for widespread corruption and criminality?

    7. Why (if true) was the Occupy Wall Street protest treated as a police code 1-34, which is used for riots? Are all protests now riots?

    8. Why has not one banker or corporate leader emerged to talk to the protesters or debate with them?

    9. Is it a coincidence that many people in the heart of the protest have had trouble getting mobile / cellphone / internet signals?

    10. Does the government genuinely believe the pent-up anger and frustration will simply go away?

    David Wendt ⋅ September 17, 2011

    #OccupyWallStreet #takewallstreet

    The Bull is in China Shop

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